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Why we're loving: Bjørn-Erik Aschim, director, The Line

Aschim is one of six directors who make up The Line collective, which created Campaign's recent ads.

July 30, 2015

How long?

2-3 minutes

Tell us about The Line. We’re a collective with a background in design and animation. We’d been working in commercials and feature films for about ten years individually but felt like we needed space to work on our own projects, so in 2013 we formed The Line. After doing some jobs with Electric Theatre Collective, we moved into its studio in Soho last year and are now represented by it. Being part of its insanely talented team means we can take on much bigger projects now and it has allowed us to expand into the world of CG.

How did you come up with the idea for the Campaign ads? We were given some killer scripts by Víctor Morón and Jose Hernandez at Saatchi & Saatchi. We were encouraged to go as crazy as we wanted, so that’s what we did. Loud colours and graphic images – the idea was to assault the senses. It’s not every day someone asks you to shoot a baby in the face. You’ve got to savour those moments in life.

Tell us about the Super Turbo Atomic Ninja Rabbit, which you created. It’s an intro sequence to the greatest 90s cartoon series that never was. Wesley Louis based it on a comic he created when he was 13. It’s a homage to the era of animation we all grew up with, such as Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and ThunderCats. Wes released it secretly online and people went nuts trying to figure out where this thing had come from. We’ll soon be revealing another cool side to this project, so keep an eye out.

What work are you most proud of? We’re extremely proud of our latest series of ads for Freeview that we co-directed with Sam Brown. Another project that stands out is the TalkTalk "date night" ads directed by Si & Ad at Academy. It was our first project with Electric Theatre Collective and kick-started a great working relationship. The Bafta nomination for our short film, Everything I Can See From Here, was also pretty sweet.

What inspires you? I think the most important thing about working in this industry is to get away from it every now and then. Inspiration comes on its own terms when you least expect it. You just have to keep your notebook handy.

What’s your next project? We’re just finishing up on Freeview and we’re developing another 2D animated ad at the moment. We’ve also got a few personal projects in the works that are unlike anything we’ve done before.